EVENTS

Violent Eliminationist Right-Wing Rhetoric

Who will be surprised if (1) this dude turns out to have fed his violence and rage on eliminationist right-wing propaganda and (2) the sick anti-American purveyors of that propaganda claim that he was a “lone nutjob” and throw a thermonuclear hissy-fit if anyone points out the undeniable causal connection between that propaganda and the violent actions of “lone nutjobs”?

Comments

Honestly I wouldn’t be surprised either. He was a “law-abiding gun owner” until he decided not to be. He only criminal offense a traffic ticket in CA. His licence plates were from TN so chances are he got his guns legally from there too. I don’t want to jump to too many conclusions, but at this point I’d be surprised if he wasn’t either conservative or insane.

Naive, we in the US have a number of domestic terrorist groups. They tend to fall into extreme right wing ideologies and like to form ‘militias’. The most famous of them is Timothy McVeigh who blew up a 8 story federal building back in 1993 (killing 168 people, 19 of which were children in the buildings daycare). The US media – particularly the right wing media such as fox news – likes to say that every act of domestic terrorism was just some single unconnected insane guy going nuts (jarrod loughner) instead of intentional action that had a group of people behind it.

Another example of the right wing media distancing itself from murder that it encourages comes from George Tiller’s case. Dr. Tiller was murdered and when the murderer was asked why, he suggested the talk show host, Glen Beck, who strongly hinted that Dr. Tiller needed to go was part of his motivation. The right wing media was more than happy to suggest that this murder was just “some lone nutjob.” It’s a way they absolve themselves of culpability for the violence they espouse.

Explain to me how this kind of premature speculation is any different from the Congressman who blamed it on the country not being Christian enough?

Because we have definable evidence of people like McVeigh, von Brunn, Breivik (norway) killing people to go along with a constant flow of arrests of militia-motivated plotters by the FBI.

In contrast, we have no evidence of such cases revolving around people’s stated or obvious motivations that they have attacked or plan to attack random innocents because they “aren’t Christian so fuckit” or what have you.

Because, James, nothing has ever happened because [nation] is not practising [religion] enough.

However, white man goes batshit with guns/bombs and kills a load of people- that’s common. Predicting that he’ll be portrayed as the “nice guy who snapped and went crazy”, that they’ll claim he’s totally unaffiliated with any kind of terrorist group? It’s a sure bet because it happens every fucking time.

If he was called Abdul and had brown skin, the right-wing pundits would be screaming about “AL-QAEDAMUSLIMBROTHERHOODSHARIALAWTERRORISTCONSPIRACY!!!!!!!!!OMG”

The attacker was an educated person, and it’s doubtful he would have been so easily swayed by Rush Limbaugh’s or by any other right wing rant. He had been accruing weaponry for months. On the one hand, the media should not report his identity other than that he had been identified by authorities, and not give him the satisfaction. On the other hand, it’s in our nature to try and make sense out of a senseless act. The attack on Giffords was committed by someone who was very obviously mentally ill. Amy Bishop blew away her colleagues, but this wasn’t such a random act, and digging into her background, she’s had a history of violence. We have yet to learn about James Holmes and why his mother responded to police by saying “you have the right person.” To some extent, gun control would help to curtail the number of casualties in attacks like this, but that will never happen, and these attacks will never stop.

The attacker was an educated person, and it’s doubtful he would have been so easily swayed by Rush Limbaugh’s or by any other right wing rant.

The number and type of irrational beliefs a person has is not related to their intellect at all. I would wager that this is especially true if you decide to use academic achievement as the measure for intelligence- where do you think all the lawyers and strategists for the bush administration’s torture program came from?

There are countless examples of smart people believing stupid things. Its nice to think intelligence can prevent someone from believing something stupid, but it simply isn’t so. Smart people just do a better job of rationalizing whatever fucked up thing they believe.

The number and type of irrational beliefs a person has is not related to their intellect at all.

You’re over simplifying here. Yes, sometimes smart people believe dumb things, but that doesn’t mean that being intelligent or educated has no bearing on the quality of our beliefs. It just means that being intelligent or educated isn’t a perfect inoculation against stupid beliefs.

So, this kid was a brilliant budding neuroscientist whose education was partially funded by a grant from NIH. Maybe the FBI should keep a closer watch on academic nutjobs, such as this guy and Amy Bishop, the “brilliant scientist” who shot up her colleagues in Alabama a few years back. Yeah, ya gotta watch out for these mad scientist types!

I call some of teh white dudes terorrists. McVeigh and Brevik. As of yesterday, I had heard of no political or other motive for Holmes, so not calling him a terrorist.

It seems also like the ‘completely senseless no-motive lone nutjob’ is an oddly white middle or upper class phenomenon. I think there is something odd other than racism in reporting going on here. Somebody else said it might be entitlement.